Map of the Week-The World According to UAlbany

I just got my alumni magazine from UAlbany aka SUNY Albany, Albany State, University at Albany (my school changes its name every other year). The cover has this world map, strangely reminiscent of the childrens' maps I showed a few weeks ago from the Barbara Petchenik Competition. Yes we're proud of our worldly outreach - we even found the other two places that are not NYC (Boston and Canada) and proudly label them on our map.
There's also a big suspension bridge linking the Rocky Mountains with the Pacific Ocean and a 150 mile tall palm tree growing in central Florida. We also moved Mount Fuji to Mongolia for your convenience!

Map of the Week - Trust the Experts

This map in today's Boston Globe reminded me of Middle East expert John McCain's various gaffes (Iran, Iraq, Sunni, Shiite, who can tell the difference?) Here's a map of his "Iraq-Pakistan Border" courtesy of Matthew Yglesias and the Atlantic Monthly.

Map of the Week - Prison Cell Mapping

The Lincoln County Jail in Wiscasset, Maine is well worth a visit. You can go into the cells of this now empty prison and see how conditions were for the prisoners. Among lots of interesting grafitti on the walls is this nicely detailed world map that I was able to photograph. The tour guide speculates that it was done by one of the many sailors who spent time there. It's not the prettiest MOTW entry ever but is very well done. Even the latitudes are shown. Ignore the areas where the paint has peeled off - those are not continents.

Map of the Week-Children are Colorful and Beauty

Every couple of years the International Cartographic Association organizes the Barbara Petchenik International World Map Design Competition for children 15 and younger. Entries are archived online by the Carleton University Library in Ottawa, Canada. You can see all kinds of fun maps on this page. Many of them are cliched and similar looking but there's also lots of clever ideas in these young minds.

This entry is entitled "The world is colorful and beauty" and was done by Ferina Tjahyana from the Pelita Harapan Junior High School in Tangerang, Indonesia. She was 13 at the time this map was done (2003).

Map of the Week-Corporal Punishment

Human Rights Watch is focused on trying to end corporal punishment in the United States. It is already banned in most states but still prevalent in many. See any pattern in this map?

Map of the Week - Georgia's Abkhazian and Ossetian Problems

It's been tough finding good maps that really show what's going on in the Caucasus region. This CIA map illustrates why the South Ossetian and Abkhazian people want independence from Georgia - though I'm not sure that being a part of Russia is really what they want either. The Abkhaz are linguistically unique while the Ossetians not only have a different language but are also not considered to be "Caucasian". The map nicely illustrates how difficult it would be to create contiguous countries in the region. Also note the proximity of other recent spots of conflict such as Chechnya, Dagestan and Nagorno-Karabakh in Azerbaijan. There are a couple of versions of this map on the web but Wikipedia has the best one I've seen.

For a nice, detailed general reference map of the region click here.

This is an interesting historical map of the region produced by American cartographer Thomas Bradford in 1835. Clicking the image will bring up a window so you can zoom and pan to get more detail.

Map of the Week - Beijing Olympic Venues

Friday is 8/8/08 and 8 being a very lucky number to the Chinese it will be the starting date for the Beijing Olympics. The Beijing 2008 website has this nice interactive map, showing the location of the venues. You can mouse over the dots to get basic information and a click on them will get pictures, diagrams, architectural drawings, links to schedules, game rules and much more. What's lacking is a mileage scale so it's not clear how close these places are to each other. Also some transit and/or parking/driving tips would be helpful. You can find that information in the "Spectator Guide"s but they could have put it in a more obvious place.
Hope your favorite country proves their athletic prowess to the world!